Cheap Phaedra, by Racine (Book) (Richard Wilbur) Price

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Customer Reviews of Phaedra, by Racine

I'm a big fan of Richard Wilbur's translations of Moliere, so I thought I'd give this one a try. Wilbur manages to reproduce the rhyme/metrical-scheme and of the original, but compared to his other translations, this one is pretty dead. Where you expect high-flying rhetoric, Wilbur never modulates out of his fusty base tone. The play is almost completely devoid of comedy, which is a shame, since Wilbur is so good at it.

This is all quibbling, of course. The bottom line is that this translation is quite readable, if not perhaps definitive. Those with access to a library might want to compare all the new translations and see which one suits them best. Fans of Wilbur are advised to stick to his Molieres.

Racine's version of the myth of Phaedrus and Hippolytus
This year I am using Jean Racine's "Phaedra" as the one non-classical text in my Classical Greek and Roman Mythology Class (yes, I know, "Classical" makes "Greek and Roman" redundant, but it was not my title). In Greek mythology, Phaedra was the half-sister of the Minotaur who was married to Theseus after the hero abandoned her sister Ariadne (albeit, according to some versions of what happened in Crete). Phaedra fell in love with her step-son Hippolytus, who refused her advances. Humiliated, she falsely accused him of having raped her.

My students read "Phaedra" after Euripides's "Hippolytus" as part of an analogy criticism assignment, in which they compare/contrast the two versions, which are decidedly different, to say the least. In the "original" Greek version Hippolytus is a follower of Artemis, and the jealous Aphrodite causes his stepmother to fall in love with him. Phaedra accuses Hippolytus of rape and then hangs herself; Theseus banished his son who is killed before Artemis arrives to tell the truth. In Racine's version Hippolytus is a famous hater of women who falls in love with Aricia, a princess of the blood line of Athens. When false word comes that Theseus is dead, Phaedra moves to put her own son on the throne. In the end the same characters end up dead, but the motivations and other key elements are different.

While I personally would not go so far as to try and argue how Racine's neo-classical version represents the France of 1677, I have found that comparing and contrasting the two versions compels students to think about the choices each dramatist has made. Both the similarities and the differences between "Hippolytus" and "Phaedra" are significant enough to facilitate this effort. Note: Other dramatic versions of this myth include Seneca's play "Phaedra," "Fedra" by Gabriele D'Annunzio, "Thesee" by Andrea Gide, and "The Cretan Woman" by Robinson Jeffers.